Neowin.net

is this program better than spybot?

I've found in using SS that it often flags items as malware incorrectly. It is too aggressive IMO in determining what is malware. I prefer other products such as ad-aware and spybot.

I do run SS every now and then just to see what it reports. It always seems to discover 'stuff' that all the other products do not. Most of the time, if not all the time, what it discovers is not malware. I really have to look carefully at what it reports.

It also has become way to bloated especially now with the added features in v4.5.

My 2 cents.

I agree with GShapiro's comments. I run MS Anti-spyware and Spybot. Things are clean but Spy Sweeper reports malware. I just don't count cookies I've allowed as a threat to my computer.

I've not had a single spyware or trojan or malware since installing spybot+adaware+ms antispyware, 100% clean scans every time for months, I am best man! I am common sense!

I feel I need to add my 2 cents since SpySweeper is getting bashed a little bit.

First, we need to keep in mind that most end-users have spyware problems. We, the average user of Neowin do not have spyware problems because we are educated users and know what not do on our computers.

Secondly, the service department that I run deals with spyware infections all day long. 90% of our business is spyware and virus removal. The average end user is plagued by spyware. We use all four products (adaware, spybot, MS and spysweeper) when removing spyware and I can tell with years of experience that SpySweeper is the best at detection and removal. I have never come across anything that spysweeper detected and removed that was a false positive.

Third, the real-time protection and shields that SpySweeper offers are the biggest difference between the free solutions. Remember to look at the entire feature set when comparing products. Spybot and Adaware will not benefit an end-user if they re-infect themselves because those products are re-active and not pro-active in their protection.

30 dollars is a modest price to pay for an end-user to have real-time protection against spyware for a full year. I would say less than 5% of the users who end up buying spyware get re-infected and that is only because they can't control their kids on the internet.

If you specifically don't have a need for SpySweeper, that's great. But, that doesn't mean it is not a viable product for many other people out there.

I agree 100%. Most end-users do not have our knowledge on how to keep spyware off our machines. Spy Sweeper is the best anti-spyware program out there and is a necessity for MOST people. I have watched this program evolve from its slow 2.6 version to what it is today, and Webroot has really done a fantastic job.

I have SPySweeper for 2 years and I"m not sorry at all

webroot spysweeper is by far the best spyware removal software out there.. beats MS and lavasoft by miles - spybot doesnt even count as a spyware removal prog anymore ..

and mrk run the trial of spysweeper and then you'll see how much you have. windows comes with alexa/ standard webpages with adds (tracking cookies etc)- and your telling us you got no spyware at all!?!?!

Yeah, SpySweeper is the absolutely best Anti-Spyware software... Its database is about 4 times bigger then everyone elses, but the scanning time is incredible anyway, and the features are awesome !! You can still use IE if you don´t care so much about speed, cause SpySweeper also has 6 shields just for IE + 10 others for other important things, like Spy Communication, Memory shield, Active-X, and the list goes on... so I really recommend it, cause even if the features are incredible, it takes almost nothing in resources, and it´s also lighter than Version 4.0....

spybot is good but this new one picks up alot,it may be 40 bucks but i just download my antispyware apps and if afterawhile the app proves good i may buy it but the one thing that may keep me from buying this is that stupid subscription thats a pain every yearif it was like every 5 years for renewal i would say yes but every year is too much.ms antispyware picks up nothing.ad aware picks up some stuff.spybot picks up a bit more but this picks them all up.i only use spybot mostly cuzz it offers protection for ie(i use opera 99% of the time)spy sweeper has never reported anything false,i at one time did not like spy sweeper but because it found so much that the others missed and i own more than 1 pc,it found stuff on them all,the real time protection it offers is nice plus it keeps getting better and better with each release and it takes barely any resources or memory(maybe a couple megs and that good)spyware doctor takes 40 megs and thats alot plus it blocks valid apps like games from running.spy sweeper does not.it protects you and i like that,plus i educate others about how to be safe n stuff and once i help them they know what to do.

Last edited by 43285 on 13 Oct 2005 - 02:46

IMO if you run SS and then blindly allow it to cleanup everything it reports than you are just asking for trouble. Maybe not immediately but down the road something may not work as expected and you will never know the cause by that time. And any Restore Points you might have will be long out of date.

In fact, any malware detector runs the same risks. I just think SS is more risky.

So my parting wisdom is.... Check out each entry that is flagged in any malware removal program before you commit. You just can't 100% count on it being right all the time. Same thing holds true for Registry cleaners.

btw... been malware and virus free for years using Ad-Aware, Spybot, and SpywareBlaster. AVG Pro is my AV program of choice.

then obviously you are not educated enuf and or do not know how to use spy sweeper properly,i have tried many but spy sweeper seems to do the best and never anything false,also AVG sucks,it detected viruses in my windows folder that were not viruses at all and after that windows would not boot so i had to format.i use either trend micro or avast and they pick up alot of stuff.

The only downside of these real-time antispywares is they are too HEAVY on systems otherwise I'd buy them

I turn off real-time everything minus my firewall, then play it safe. To make up for it I just scan my whole system with NOD32 and a couple spyware apps a few times a week.

what do you mean heavy?a few megs is heavy?get real man,if they used like 40 megs to 100 megs of ram just for them then that would be considered heavy but in todays modern pcs they have lots of memory,if you would have said that in the 95 days when memory was sparse then it would have been considered heavy.a few megs of ram just for the protection is well worth it for what this app offers,the ms antispyware picks up nothing.